We are ghosts inhabiting a shell made of flesh, but what of the internet and the desktop computer as another type of shell. The Internet itself is a shell with massive amounts of data which interact at any given time and that in the shell of cyberspace, an intelligent life form can form. Kind of hard to describe in a few words, so let's discuss to make it a little easier.
Concept: The Internet is filled with data. I addition, the Internet has viruses, programs and other applications happening all at once. Some of that data even gets lost. On top of this, some of these programs and viruses are designed to either collect data or to mimic other programs. As artificial intelligence programs also get lost on the Internet, they too get mixed in this soup of data. From this point some scientists believe life from this lost data collecting together can spontaneously erupt.
Questions: If you are asking yourself "why is he bringing this topic to his blog?" then I will tell you there is a reason. The first reason is that it is an interesting concept and the idea that life can form spontaneously like this is just fascinating. Another, but more important reason is because we all will be interacting with computers on a more personal basis in the future. They already have systems to read brainwaves which are used to move objects like wheelchairs for the disabled with more applications to come. Some scientists are trying to hook up their brains to the Internet so as to explore other possibilities of the man and machine interface. With that said, this brings us to yesterdays issue on down loadable soldiers. Can a human mind survive cyberspace and come out the same person? And can life actually form on the internet without help?
Of the mind and cyberspace: I believe that the human mind is still too complex for a computer to understand. While programs can mimic human learning and some basic emotions, they cannot feel the way we do. As such, if we were to dump our brains into a computer, it is my personal belief we will loose emotion. In short, we will become as cold as the machine itself due to our brains being too complex to copy. On top of this, it is my feeling that the human mind will loose all sense of self if exposed to something as vast as the Internet. All that data is now also interacting with yourself and being shared. In short, a passing cyber virus or program may just rip a part of your mind off and move on, leaving you with gaps in both memory and maybe even physically damaged and disabled.
Let us also not forget about hackers. Another worry is if the mind somehow survives the riggers of cyberspace, will it survive a cyber attack. Imagine the president of the
With the aforementioned said, data colleting together will not form an intelligent life form. Sure there are programs designed to eat lost bits of data, but that data must be useful in some way to bring forth life. So unless it can learn like a human can then it will not work. Yes they do have learning robots with a certain level of intelligence, but intelligent life is not just knowledge alone. It is also emotion which can only be mimicked by commuters. As such, even if the data collects into something that can interact in some way with humans, it cannot surpass humans with respect to the fact that it has no emotion. Therefore, it cannot be considered truly alive.
Conclusion: I personally think the Internet is much too vast to actually create life on its own. However, I do think with people starting to think they can interact with it beyond the physical level; the risks of our ghost in our fleshy shells are put at risk of loosing ourselves. More and more we must think upon the ethics and implications of technology and its dangers in addition to its benefits. While the ideas of life on the net (ours or artificial) is intriguing, it does not mean it should be attempted without proper precautions and measured risk.
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